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What’s the best cure for the common cold?

Cold season is quickly approaching, and this study reveals one of the best-known cures for the common cold.

It will only be a matter of time before we are bombarded by reminders to get vaccinated for the flu ahead of the cold winter season. While the seasonal flu can be prevented by a vaccine, there is still no known method of medically preventing the more than 200 strains of virus that cause what we know as the “common cold.”

According to a report from The Examiner, everybody is likely to come down with the common cold at some point, and there is only one sure-fire way to speed up your recovery – sleep.

An article published earlier this month in the online journal SLEEP reveals that being unrested is a significant factor in your overall risk of contracting a virus that causes the common cold. Researchers from the University of California in San Francisco, Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center studied the sleep duration and continuity of 164 healthy men and women between the ages of 18 and 55.

Participants were quarantined and given nasal drops containing rhinovirus, the strain that is linked to upwards of 80 percent of all common cold cases. The researchers monitored the participants over a five-day period to see if they got sick. People who slept less than 5 hours a day were significantly more likely to contract the cold than people who slept for at least 7 hours.

Even though there is no cure for the common cold and no vaccine to prevent it, the easiest way to avoid getting sick this winter is to make sure you are getting plenty of sleep each night.